Neighbourhood councils are sub-municipal committees which operate within a geographically delimited area of a municipality or a municipal department. Their activities cover a single established policy area such as social services (single functioned committee) or several areas such as education, leisure, and social issues (multi-functioned committee). The thesis includes a comparative analysis of the origin, occurance, and performance of multi-functioned neighbourhood councils in Finland, Norway, and Sweden during the period 1968-1986. In the case of Denmark, the debate is analyzed and the question posed as to why neighbourhood councils were not introduced during this period.It is the interplay between a number of factors which determines how and why neighbourhood councils occur and in some cases endure and are developed further. The countries' traditions and characteristics - such as the size of the public sector and local government's share of it, size of municipalities, and political culture - are important in this context. Increased democracy and greater effectivity were the main aims of the reform and these have been achieved to some extent. The occurance of neighbourhood councils also means that participation, recruitment, articulation of demands, and communication between elector and elected are changed and somewhat improved. Where neighbourhood councils exist, greater consideration is given to geographical (rather than departmental) principles in the distribution and redistribution of services and welfare. Neighbourhood councils are clearly a source of further variation between and within the Nordic countries. It is, however, too early to judge whether the variation within countries will develop into inappropriate deviations from the principal of equal services for all or if they, on the contrary, are indications of greater future responsiveness. / digitalisering@umu